June 3 - 4 (Day 124-125) - Bundaberg to Benaraby

Wednesday 3 June - Bundaberg to Benaraby (Boyne River)

We enjoyed a fairly slow morning at our free camp as we needed to pass some time for the Bundaberg Barrel to open at 10am. We packed up our things and headed off and the first stop was a Bunnings for a few things. We needed a 15amp power cord so we could connect the output of the inverter to the van's official power inlet point so we could use all powerpoints from the inverter (when needed).

We then made it to the Bundaberg Barrel only to find that it was still shut and we had read the sign wrong. :( It had said that you could buy drinks online and pickup from 10am - 2pm or something like that. Anyway we hung around and discussed what we would do next and in that time a lady had come to the door and asked us if we were OK. We told her what we had thought and our reason for being there (which was also to buy some of their drinks), so she sold us a slab of soft drink bottles and we were on our way!

Then we were on our way out of Bundaberg onto our next destination. Along the way we went past various fields of macadamia trees and sugarcane.

Crossing the bridge in Bundaberg

For hundreds of kilometres, there is just
sugar cane everywhere!

Entertainment while driving

On our last trip we would often do a Bible reading in the car during the morning. On this trip, as we aren't in as much of a hurry, we tend to do this in the van before we leave. It's certainly easier to concentrate and all follow along, and it means we can mark in interesting points we discover and discuss on the spot. However on occasions when things have been busy (e.g. coming back from Fraser Island), we'll do one of our readings in the car.

For the rest of the time however, we will typically listen to audiobooks. On this trip, and our last actually, we've really enjoyed Richmal Crompton's 'Just William', and Sherlock Holmes. Mim's got an Audible subscription so we downloaded the Just William's read by Martin Jarvis, and the Complete Sherlock Holmes Collection read by Stephen Fry. Both narrators have a very appropriate voice for the work they're reading.

She's home!

So our drive today consisted of more of the same. But after a while we were getting a little tired so we pulled off the highway and headed for a nearby town called Rosedale in the hope of finding some afternoon tea and to stretch our legs. We each chose an ice-cream and milk drinks and enjoyed them in the car before setting off again, passing a very aptly named town along the way! :)

We had looked up a free camp on the Boyne river in Benaraby which looked quite nice so made our way there. The camp spot was right on the river bank, so we made our way carefully down the track (which we had read could get quite bad at some point for 4WD's only). Despite some 'oh my goodness'es from some of the passenger, we made it down absolutely fine and Matthew expertly backed the car and van into the spot we'd picked for the night. It was such a beautiful spot. So quiet and just us. We were actually camped in the river bed itself, and the floor was completely smooth round rocks, but they seemed quite dry, so we weren't too concerned. It might have been different if it'd been the wet season.

We took some photos of the beautiful surroundings and saw that there seemed to be quite a few fish jumping around so tried out hand at fishing again because the fish looked quite a decent size. But again to no avail. :(

Jude enjoyed skimming rocks and then wanted to go for a swim. The water was so cold he wasn't in for that long. Greg did wade across to the other side to try a different fishing spot where the fish seemed active, but didn't catch anything there either. They both enjoyed a nice hot shower upon returning to the caravan. Thank goodness for a shower point and a hot water service - this van, for us at least, is a huge improvement from our dear little Hacienda van waiting for us back in Adelaide.

Hello ocean!

Well now the fun begins!

At some point in the evening we noticed the river water seemed a bit closer than it had been earlier. Was it our imagination? A bit later we checked again, and sure enough it was slowly creeping up to the van! This river, on inspection, led out to the ocean at Tannum Sands, so it was a river which would be affected by tides. But as the tide continued to approach, we decided to pack up quickly and move closer to the edge of the river bed, by which time the water had actually reached the caravan!

Unfortunately there was no tide data for where we were staying, so we had to use the tide data from the river mouth and then somehow calculate whereabouts on the river bed a 6m tide would come up to, and how long it would take a 6m tide to flow about 10km upstream. I checked the ground and was able to pick up what appeared to be a high tide mark along the ground where the last high tide had obviously been. From checking the tide levels, it appeared the high tide at the river mouth that evening was only going to be about 30cm higher than the previous one, and we had moved considerably higher than that. And based on the current water level and my estimation of how far it had to go to reach the morning's high tide, I guessed we were about two hours behind what the river mouth was doing.

However as we scouted around we found water starting to fill up some lower points near where we had camped, so we decided to move a second time up out of the river bed entirely. The track out went through a bit of a dip, which ended up being about 30cm deep by the time we passed! We then parked the car and van in the roadway (which Mim wasn't totally comfortable with but not much other option for the time of night we moved) and leveled up and settled for the night. Mim put a sign up to warn anyone if they did decide to come that way that we were parked there so best to find a different route. Thankfully no-one needed to come down the road that we were parked in. But what an eventful night.

Thursday 4 June - Boyne River

Our campsite for the night

 In the morning we had a look at the ground to see if we could work out where we had parked and how far the water had come up. We could see from the markings in the stones where we were and how far the what had to come. It looked like our estimation of the previous night's tide was about right, in terms of how far up it was going to come. We set up the gopro to try and capture how quickly the water was actually coming in but the morning tide wasn't as big so it wasn't much point in the end. However, watching when the tide turned showed us that we were about 90 minutes behind the tide at the river mouth, so last night's estimation was pretty close to the mark. We didn't at the time realise how useful this accurate data would be to know later!

Our new site for the day.

We couldn't stay in the roadway, so we relocated the van back into the river bed but at a much higher point than it was the night before, being comforted by the fact the river didn't actually get near where we had first relocated the van to anyway.

 We had eggs and bacon on muffins for breakfast (yum!) then did our morning readings. The day's Joshua reading was about how the eastern 2 1/2 tribes made a memorial at the bank of the Jordan, an act which was misinterpreted by their brethren as making an idol and initially caused quite a ruckus. Given we were on a river bank and had plenty of rocks, we re-enacted the process in the Boyne River. It was a fun little exercise, it helps to reinforce the story, and interestingly enough (writing this on June 13) our subsequent readings have given us cause to refer back to this incident, and having re-enacted it it was easy for the kids to recall!

The kids also made this rock formation to see how well it stayed when the tide rose.

We got some school and business work done throughout the morning and early afternoon, which was quite profitable.

After this, various people were wanting to do different things. I think Bek was on a phone call, Matt was doing something else (might have been school work) and Jude wanted to go for a swim. I hadn't originally intended on swimming but Jude really wanted me to. We had a splash around, walked across to the other side of the river and then back. However the rocks were pretty sharp and at one point my foot slipped and it hurt a bit. It was hard to tell what had happened but it kept hurting so I limped a bit back to the bank with Jude's help.

When we got back we noticed my toe was bleeding quite a lot so hobbled over to the van to inspect the cut or cuts. It looked quite deep so we cleaned it out and put a bandaid on it then thought maybe we should go for drive to get it stitched up. So we packed up a few things and headed for Gladstone Hospital. Thankfully no-one else was waiting so we didn't have to wait too long. They cleaned it some more but were very happy with how well it had already been cleaned, so they steri-stripped it and taped some of the toes together and said to keep it out of water for the next 3 days and we were good to go.

By this time it was dinner time so we stopped at Pizza Hut in Gladstone and bought pizza for tea. The seating area still wasn't open so we ate it in the car, then drove back to the camp and headed to bed.

We hopped into bed, with me nursing my newly strapped toe, and this should have been the end of the day's activity. But about 9:30 we heard a couple of odd noises outside. It sounded like a metal bucket moving, and then after a bit more was a rock knocking together sound. I looked outside, and was most surprised to see water outside the door! The tide had risen further than the night before, which I knew was going to happen, but not that it would get to where we were! What had actually happened is that there was a high point between us and the river, and the rising tide had breached the lowest point of this kind of levee and was now flowing quickly into the 'lagoon' in which we were camped.

Oh no. Not again!

I hobbled across to get some photos, but quickly found myself marooned a few metres from the van by the rising water, given I had to keep my wound dry. This left Mim, and Bek who woke by the activity outside, having to hold the fort of securing all loose items around the van. It was almost comical seeing first our caravan levelling ramps, then one of our folding camp chairs, and a little while later a plastic engine oil container, all becoming buoyant and starting to sail off downstream for the river mouth before they were dutifully retrieved by Mim or Bek!

The brave rescuers!

Of course the next plan was to work out how much further the water was going to rise, and this is where our calculations from this morning were infinitely helpful. High tide at the river mouth was supposed to peak about 8:10pm, and it was now about 9:40pm. This meant, theoretically, that we were already at high tide. Of course the water rushing into the lagoon didn't give that impression, but that was the reality. With the help of some foliage, I could tell the tide in the main channel had indeed just turned, as the leaf I threw in was slowly starting back down the river. This meant our only concern was how much the water level in the lagoon needed to rise before it started receding. But this we were able to roughly determine by how quickly it was flowing, and it was clear the water was now not rushing in anywhere near as quickly as before. So a decision was made to stay where we were, despite being 25cm deep in water. This turned out to be the right decision, as within 30 minutes it was clear the water level was starting to recede.

With their help I was able to get back to the van where we woke the boys, showed them the fun and then all headed to bed ourselves!

The level the next day - 25cm

-- Greg